


"Want some company?"

by Kate88



Series: Striketober 2020 [2]
Category: Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith
Genre: Gen, Minor Spoilers, Post-Troubled Blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:33:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26776678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kate88/pseuds/Kate88
Summary: Written over Primary 3's lunch-break.  Entirely unedited and posted so as to avoid over-thinking.
Series: Striketober 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948660
Comments: 5
Kudos: 28
Collections: Striketober | Cormoran Strike Fictober 2020





	"Want some company?"

**Author's Note:**

> Written over Primary 3's lunch-break. Entirely unedited and posted so as to avoid over-thinking.

It took her by surprise, even though logic and biology dictated it would happen eventually.

_Pleased to announce the arrival of Baby Cunliffe. Mum and baby both doing well._

Cursing the algorithm that meant Matthew’s post was the first one on her Facebook feed (friends of bloody friends) Robin stared at the picture. The baby didn’t look at all happy about its current situation. Tiny and red-faced with small, angry fists, Robin could see nothing of either of its parents in its features. Vaguely, she wondered if Matthew had been disappointed not to have gotten a more beatific picture.

Without thinking, she took a screenshot and sent it to Ilsa. 

Approximately ten seconds later, her stomach dropped to somewhere in the region of her toes and she fumbled for Ilsa’s number in her contact list.

“Hi Robs” Ilsa greeted her.

“That was a bloody insensitive thing to do Ils. I am so, so sorry”.

“Don’t be daft” her friend replied, and Robin could practically hear the shrugging of her shoulders. “I don’t hate babies. Just my inability to have one”.

“Oh Ils. I really am sorry” Robin sighed, rubbing one hand over her face.

“Stop it. Let’s talk about the fact that Matthew and Sarah have a very ugly baby”.

Robin chuckled, but the noise rang hollow even to her own ears.

“Are you okay Robin?” Ilsa asked gently.

“I’m fine” she replied quickly.

“It’s okay if you’re not. It must feel bizarre”.

Robin sat quietly for a moment contemplating the strange, hollow ache in her chest. She was okay. She was more than okay. But still _two roads diverged in a yellow wood…_

“Well…yeah. It is” she admitted eventually. “Don’t get me wrong. I made the right choice. I don’t regret it and I’d make the same one again. It’s just…there’s a whole other life out there, running parallel to this one. I’ll never know how it could have turned out”.

Both friends were quiet for a moment. Robin knew Ilsa was contemplating her own parallel life.

“Do you want some company?” Ilsa asked eventually.

Strike was in Cornwall visiting Ted. Max was on night-shoots all week. She could call Masham, but didn’t think she could face her mother’s outrage, cast anew by this latest development. 

“Yeah, okay then. Tottenham at six?” she suggested.

“See you then”.

Ilsa hung up, and Robin took one more look at the photo of furious Baby Cunliffe before putting her phone into her handbag. She returned to the new client file she had been updating and began transcribing details of yesterday’s interview, and within ten minutes her mind was back on the job, mulling over possible lines of enquiry and the three possible theories she was going to run by Strike on his return.


End file.
